Restraint
by Atheniandream
Summary: Based on Spoilers for Season 8.


_**Author's Notes:**_ In lieu of Darvey Week. I know this scene won't go anything like this, so it gives me creative license to play… :evil face: *Based on that 8.01/8.02 Spoiler Photo. Only a little one-shot. Apologies if I've written something like this before. Their interactions are like a constant stream of reality tv in my mind.

. . ..

 **Restraint**

By Atheniandream

. ...

 _Everything seems to be_

 _Falling apart_

 _In some technicolor_

 _And oh, I saw you put your soul_

 _In the cast_

 _Of what used to be our love_

. . ..

The number of times that Harvey Specter has sought out Donna Paulsen, are less than he can count on both hands, which, over the very long and ingrained period that they have worked together, is very few, in the grand scheme of things.

He's….out of sorts lately. He's not depressed as such, or angry. That would be going too far. Instead, he's sort of...frustrated, off kilter almost, as if this world around him is as it seems, but with a net tightening around him, confining him slowly. Like a quiet street at night, with lamps that are flicker with a suspense and a rose tinted strangeness. Like a storm brewing, but one that he can't see coming and is only aware of the mere possibility of.

It's unnerving, this feeling within him, And he's finely stuck, between this indifference and that itch of the uncomfortable. Like a seat that's not quite right, but seemingly fit for purpose.

Maybe he is thinking of other things these days. Of any entirely different seat altogether.

Thinking of his personal future, and less about work. Maybe he is growing into something new. Something altered. Something more than what people have ever seen him as before.

It's a game changer for him, for sure.

He's been thinking about wants, and ideals and dreams, more than he's ever allowed himself to before.

Mike Ross followed his dreams. He always had done, being the heart-on-the-sleeve kind of guy that Harvey had grown to accept him as over the years. Now that he has sailed off into new adventures, with a new bride, a new challenge and an even newer horizon, his absence hasn't reverberated quite like the other times he had left or been incarcerated. In turn, this is a very different era for Harvey. The merger, and any changes with it are now being over taken by a strange need to fall back on the habits of before, but in a healthier, more consistent way. A new angle of the old. These days, he's feeling the itch to knock pins down rather than assemble them for others to head.

 _Maybe being the boss wasn't all it was cracked up to be..._

 _Maybe he doesn't want to fight like that anymore._

 _Maybe he's always been a man of smaller victories, rather than just the one._

He frowns, the idea of being the top dog now falling short against his confidences.

There is one thing, though, that is growing with every second, and like a rolling ball of circumstance it's begun to boulder over every other problem in his life with a release of positive energy.

And it's that positive energy, that he is desperately in need of today.

His form rounds there corner, opening his view to the back end of the file room.

He knows she's in here. He's always had a sixth sense for it, like an invisible string between them, that links her to him in those moments that he needs her.

He glances down at his suit. He's seen her this morning, albeit briefly, but it occurs to him that she hasn't mentioned his mood, not even once. She does that less now, since they split their working partnership into a more long distance one. Now she only comments if he is at odds or directly seeking her council. He has never been in doubt of her ability to read him over the years, but today he feels rather self conscious about it. He's wearing a slate grey suit, indicating that his mood is casual, mellow to almost bittersweet melancholy, and offset by a seriousness in his jet black silk tie. He only knows this, because she's told him before.

He never used to dress with emotional thought, but over a decade with the woman, and it's carved her lessons and many observations into his mind with every twist of his tie and cufflink into each buttonhole.

 _In truth, if she ever knew how much he listened to her, she'd probably never let him live it down._

He sighs, spotting her, orange and peach and black and rather formal as she stands, poised and cross legged at the ankles beside the whirring copier.

She glances to him, her neck craning with that perceptive glare from her large mascara rimmed eyes.

He pauses on the spot, his head tilting at her, a tired look painting his face at not quiet being able to sneak up on her, before he slides to her left side in quiet defeat.

"What can I do for you, Harvey?" She says automatically, falling on old habits.

"Um...You don't happen to know where the Freemont paperwork is?" He asks, adjusting his gait, his jaw flexing slightly as he watches her long fingers elegantly flip the papers over, one by one, as they slide out of the copier with a whir.

"Well...last I looked, they were on the coffee table in your office." She says, a colourful bend in her tone that causes their eyes to meet. "But, I think we both know that you knew that all ready." She points out with a smile.

He sighs, feeling transparent against her keen deduction, as he straightens, his chest broadening enough to fill him with air and and little gussy.

"You okay?" She asks, turning to slightly to him.

"I'm…. _fine_." He says, the word dropping like a sack of New Hampshire potatoes.

There is a beat between them, born out of years of comfortable silences.

"It's okay to miss him, you know." She tells him, her hands beginning to move once more, pressing at the copier's various functions.

His eyes flick up to hers then, dark and reserved.

"I miss them too." She says, the delicate admission framed with a fragility, adding her own feelings into the mix.

"It's not that," He says gently, passing the idea off in his mind. "I don't know...somethings just... ** _not right_**." He says, squinting against the fact.

" _With the merger_?" She frowns slightly, gathering some pages in her hands.

"No. I...maybe...I don't know." He shrugs finally, feeling stupid now. "Everything's just…" His eyebrows twitch matter of factly, his hand raising to tap the side of the copier that she doesn't occupy.

 _If he can't even articulate his feelings, then what good is he? Maybe he finally needs a vacation. Maybe he should say 'to hell with it all' and steal her away…_

"Harvey...things will work out as they're supposed to."

Her words slap at him, cutting through his thoughts like a hot knife in butter.

He finds himself smiling then, disbelief in his eyes as he regards her with a pointedness.

It takes less than a second before her chin juts back, scrutinising the air around him, her posture taking on an alertness, reacting to that note of challenge in his eyes that has nothing to do with their future places in the firm.

"Har-vey," She says, stretching his name against the chopping board of her resolve, as she catches up with the double meaning that even from her own mouth, she obviously never saw coming.

It's a warning to him, but one that he knows holds no weight now.

He likes this different version of her. It's ambiguous, less sure of herself and therefore less rigid than her role in his life has ever been before.

He struggles with his own ripening enjoyment of the fact, as it breeds more room between them than ever before. More room for looks and gestures and mistakes and lies and fun little games that don't hurt, but instead tantalise and encourage something to blossom between them.

It's just a look that he gives her, but on his expressive features, to her, it's like the Las Vegas Strip against the cloaking dark of the Nevada desert.

"We are _at work_." She says staunchly.

He smirks then, the tension in his body softening to make way for other more vibrant feelings.

" ** _What_**?" He shrugs, playing at picture of innocence, frowning minutely, his onyx tinted eyes sparkling in a way that causes her nostrils to flare. He smirks again when she huffs, rolling her eyes at his advances.

When it comes to them, he's slowly understanding that she's not so great at words, having run out long past the _'I'm not in love with you's_ and ' _I love you's_ and _"I didn't feel anything when I kissed you's_ and even the _'Don't mind if I do's._

He turns on her then, all smoulder and interest as he leans on the corner of the large copier, playing his intention to maximum effect. "So...it's _**not**_ just gonna be a one time th-"

"I advise _heavily_ that you **_do not_** finish that sentence." She reams, cutting him off with a cat like reflex, glaring good naturedly at him then, the pile of papers in her hands the perfect A4 defence against his eager form.

"I don't need advising, Donna." He says coolly. "You're _not_ my assistant anymore, remember?" He reminds her, turning fully towards her, a fire lighting inside of him at the way she moves with him despite her firmly held refusal.

"Oh, so you're finally coming around to that fact?" She goads, looking at him in a way that makes his groin ache.

"Well...with a little _encouragement_ , I could...concede to the idea." He plays.

"Encouragement? For something that happened six months ago?" She clarifies with a careful smile, not giving him the rope just yet.

He sighs, shaking his head. "You're not going to make this easy _at all_ , are you?" He accuses, his eyes narrowing as he steals a glance at her lips, peachy and pouting at him.

"You've never liked easy." She reminds him. "Or are we forgetting Scottie?" She adds, almost coaxing him.

" _That_ was different." He counters, taking a slight step towards her. "Right now, the easy path is looking...rather appealing."

"Oh," She straightens, her game face sliding in place. "So you think I'm 'easy'?"

" _Well, easy's not the first thing that springs to mind_ , but," He says, his features sharpening in a muddle of interest, arrogance and dare it be acknowledged, attraction.

"If anyone's easy, obviously, it would be you." She counters.

He smiles then, caught up in her ballsy and rather coolly dismissive attitude. "And yet you've always told me I was **_difficult_**." He counters, his smile bending crookedly.

"A man can be several things," She tells him, her eyebrow arching sharply to make her point.

"And yet, right now, I'm feeling that I'm very much _one_ thing in particular." He pouts, closing the distance between them as he steals a breath, catching himself in the feint note of her perfume, cherries and that achingly familiar vanilla scent that he's started painting her with in his dreams.

He watches her visibly swallow, collecting every insinuation that lingers on his face.

There is a restraint to her, cloaking the inner workings of something pulling over her mind.

 ** _Donna Roberta Paulsen, the emotionally closed book._**

"Come out with me tonight." He insists.

"And where would you be taking me? Let me guess... _BED_?" She offers sharply, referring to a vibrant nightclub of their past and his insinuated destination of their immediate future.

"One, Bed closed years ago,"

"I know. You went to their closing party."

"Touche." He says, his eyebrow twitching at the many memories that the one word encourages on all available levels. His tact changes instantly though, as he straightens, his face becoming serious. "I mean it. Dinner. Dancing. _Dessert?_ "

"Who says I want to be seen out with the notorious Harvey Specter?" She offers boldly, a hand sliding onto her hip as she waits for him to collect himself.

"Fine," He says deftly. "My place. Take out. Just _one_ bed."

"You're not going to give up are you?" She observes, narrowing her eyes.

"Don't overthink it, Donna. Just... _come_."

She laughs then, a sputter at the shock of his forwardness in a freudian slip, as she glances around them, thankfully quashing the possibility of awkward onlookers. By the time she looks back he's already closer than he'd expected to be allowed in such an official work environment.

"Come on..." He says, his voice sultry beyond measure. "Just... _say_...'Yes'." He presses.

"So that''s what it's going to take for you to leave me to my copying?" She asks.

"Well… that...and a kiss." He offers, his face deliberately and rather schemingly dead-panned.

Her mouth opens, wholly shocked at his words, before she regains her composure, a stutter between the transition that he's never seen in her before as her head tilts, a reservedness flying onto her face. "It's never just a kiss with you." She states.

"Uh...excuse me, I have restraint." He says, objection riding the colour on his lips.

"Then bring your _restraint_ , or what's left of it, to my apartment. At Seven thirty. Sharp." She orders lightly, turning her attention back to the copier before waiting for his answer.

The thought lingers for just a second, of grabbing her and kissing her and stilling that need that keeps raging inside him like an impatient infant.

In that second, a stray Associate wanders into the room, dashing every hope he has of getting his way.

He sighs. _She's right._

With her, restraint is hard to come by, it seems.

"Have a nice day, Donna." He says casually, straightening with a professionalism that seems to slip away from them with every passing day.

He smirks well into the afternoon, a victory plotted carefully in his mind's eye.

His future is starting to take an altogether different shape.

. . ...

 _When I woke up_

 _Nothing was the way it seemed_

 _A body needs_

 _Torn between the force inside_

 _Then I broke out_

 _Realised what you were to me_

 _And though we tried_

 _Could we have known what love was like?_

 _I know it might go wrong_

 _If you and I go on_

 _In time I can let go_

 _I can only hope_

 _Ah yes, I know it's so cold_

' _Stranded' By Flight Facilities_

. .


End file.
